Storylines will help build your brand

Taking your company to market is a complex process. There are numerous voices involved in bringing a brand to life, and business owners often focus their sharpest ears on the obvious ones such as end users and media. This is a starting point, but there are typically far more opportunities to clarify how you’re perceived in the marketplace.

When you think about the way you want people talking about your brand, you’re really talking about crafting an integrated story — and the stakeholders, they’re your content distributors. Making use of all of the storylines available can change your game by uncovering opportunities or more efficient resource allocation. A great exercise is to build a well thought-out stakeholder path and brand storyboard. The more resources you invest, the greater the return. In my mind, this is how great brands are built:

Research Spend as much time as you can trying to really understand all these people. Cite examples, build profiles and include your team in putting it all together. Get a very real picture of your understanding of not just who they are, but why they’re a part of your wheel.

Understand Put together a survey or get conversational — the choice is yours. But recognize their understanding of your relationship and your company may be different than yours. Without this insight, you risk very real gaps.

Design We’re talking a communications strategy that treats brand-building efforts as editorial content of sorts. Ensure your various storylines are going to be receiving consistent but custom content regularly.

Going through this process is time-consuming, but will help make your brand a story stakeholders can eventually become a part of. And, in a marketplace that moves quickly enough to put all of us at risk of commodification, it’s a story we should all buy into.

Jacquelyn Cyr is chief executive of Espresso (espressoagency.com), an integrated brand agency. She believes every business model can be made better. Please send questions, along with feedback or insights to gamechanger@espressoagency.com